Le Carré with Gary Oldman at the British Premiere of Tinker Sailor Soldier Spy in 2011AFP/Getty Images

Dwight Garner

Last updated at 3:51PM, May 4 2013

He may be now 81, but John le Carré is as opinionated as ever. The storyteller par excellence talks about ageing, class, the War on Terror – and what happened when he took cocaine

Earlier this year, two dozen or so foxhounds are streaming through the streets
of St Buryan, a village in Cornwall not far from Land’s End. Behind them
drifts a loose formation of men and women perched atop well-groomed horses.
As the hunt clops through town, John le Carré, the pre-eminent spy writer of
the 20th century, sips from a paper cup of warm whisky punch, doled out by a
local pub to riders and spectators. At 81, he remains an enviable specimen
of humanity: tall, patrician, with a ruddy complexion. His white hair is
floppy and well cut (so much